Rob Lyon – ironsmith

Friday

Aug 24, 2012 at 6:00 AM

Rob Lyon and his wife, Ruth, had just returned from the Brimfield Flea Market, where they had picked up a door latch and a pair of andirons, among other things.

The door latch had missing parts, which Lyon would replace by crafting new ones in his shop out back. “I’ll even make the nails,” he said. In recreating matching pieces, he sometimes has to copy an intricate pattern. He honed his skills as a blacksmith by producing replicas of antiques.

Honed his skills, indeed.

Lyon, whose home is in West Brookfield, is a renowned artisan. Often commissioned to do custom work, he has made pieces for the Smithsonian Institution, for motion pictures and for historic homes. He has produced hinges for actor Hal Holbrook’s house in California and created four full-sized weathervanes on a very tight schedule for a folk-art-themed restaurant in Rockefeller Center in New York City.

“People know about me,” Lyon said. “I get calls from people restoring a house or building a barn. They want hinges and latches.”

Lyon, a lifelong history buff, first encountered blacksmithing on a visit to Old Sturbridge Village in 1971. On touring the various craft shops, he felt an immediate affinity for the heat of the forge and the artistry of the ironsmith. He spent the next winter driving up from Hartford every Monday to take lessons from the village’s master blacksmith, Frank Grapes.

Grapes soon recommended that the village hire Lyon. He is now in his 39th year as an OSV interpreter and blacksmith. During that time, Lyon has studied with several of the country’s foremost craftsmen, including Donald Streeter, a restoration ironsmith, and Francis Whitaker, who is called “the dean of American blacksmiths.” Lyon is now the lead blacksmith at the village.

Soon after moving to Massachusetts, Lyon also developed his own business.

“I purchased an anvil, forge and hammers,” he said. “I was living at a place where I could do it on the side and earn extra money. I really enjoyed bringing antique pieces back to life.”

He and Mrs. Lyon, who is a history buff as well as an antiques expert, turned Lyon Iron into a thriving business specializing in the restoration of a variety of items for, as they describe it, “home and hearth.”

In the course of his career, Lyon at one point got into making miniatures. A fireplace mantel in the couple’s home is lined with tiny, exquisite kitchen utensils. “They’re big in the doll house world,” he said holding up a Lilliputian frying pan. “Everything has to be to scale. Miniatures take five times as long to make.”

Out in his workshop, Lyon fired up his forge to demonstrate how any piece of iron can be heated and hammered into shape. Nearby stood a massive trip hammer — the ultimate pounding tool — that had once served as an essential piece of equipment in a now defunct Worcester factory. “The only thing I had to do was get it oiled up,” he said.

Lyon pointed to a Revolutionary War firearm for which he is making parts. “That’s a labor of love,” he remarked with a smile. He held up a shovel dating to 1810. He only had to straighten, clean and polish it before putting it on the market.

In another outbuilding, he and his wife keep many of the items they have for sale.

Surrounded by wonderful old pots, kettles and cauldrons dating from the 18th and 19th centuries, I pointed to several odd-looking rotund objects and asked about them. Lyon replied that they are called tin kitchens and are used to roast meat by a fireplace.